The present invention relates to a pulse combustor wherein a mixture gas of air and fuel is intermittently supplied into a combustion chamber and, within this combustion chamber, an explosive combustion is caused to take place repeatedly in the form of a pulse.
Generally, a pulse combustor has a combustion chamber and a cylindrical mixing chamber which communicates with the upstream side of the combustion chamber. An air supply pipe and a fuel supply pipe are respectively connected, at one end, to the mixing chamber. Air and fuel are respectively introduced into the mixing chamber through the air supply pipe and fuel supply pipe. The air and fuel thus introduced are mixed together in the mixing chamber, and then this mixture gas is subjected to explosive combustion within the combustion chamber.
In this type of pulse combustor, in order to cause the pulse combustion to take place under a stable and moderate condition, it is necessary to quickly mix together the air and fuel introduced into the mixing chamber through the air supply pipe and fuel supply pipe. In a prior art pulse combustor of this type, however, the air supply pipe and fuel supply pipe are provided in such a manner that each of their axes extends in a direction to intersect a central axis of the mixing chamber at right angles thereto while their axes intersect each other at right angles. The air stream and fuel gas stream introduced into the mixing chamber is mixed together by colliding against each other substantially at right angles. For this reason, a mixing of the air with the fuel gas fails to be effected uniformly, so that the quality of their mixture is bad. At the same time, it was also possible that at the time of ignition which starts the pulse combustor, the air-fuel mixture gas will fail to be ignited by an ignition plug. Further, since the air and fuel gas introduced into the mixing chamber each impinge, substantially perpendicularly, upon the inner wall surface of the mixing chamber, the resistance to their inflow into the mixing chamber increases. As a result, the problem that the air and fuel gas fail to be supplied smoothly may also be raised. For this reason, particularly where a fuel having a relatively high combustion rate such as a hydrogen-based fuel is used, its combustion characteristic is likely to be degraded and, at the same time, it is likely that the pulsation will be unstable.